Playing Catch

This is arguably true with the surface-level performances over time, but certainly true comparing his game to other dominant games in MLB history. Last night's game was the first Game Score of 100 I can remember seeing in a while. I think the historical comparisons are fair. Obviously, if a pitcher is matching/outdoing what we're seeing from the greats of recent vintage, like Skenes, Sanchez, Scherzer, DeGrom, etc., that alone says a lot about how special they've been. But I think the question, though, is if he's performing like Bob Gibson in '68? MLB is a pretty offensively challenged league in 2026 so far. With that said, so much of the reason that it's a depressed offensive environment is because never before have pitchers thrown with such dominant ability and intent. It's probably time to compare his fastball with other sport-breaking superlatives that required rules changes to their respective games. Even though he pitched like Cy Young last night, though, doesn't mean he'll be Don Larson in a playoff series. Any team that's going into a playoff series with a guy that's capable of putting up a HOF-level performance like last night, is going to have a good advantage. But I don't think that it changes the math on how to pursue "the window". In fact, I just don't believe in windows. I think Attanasio and the Brewers organization merely opened doors and walked through them, and they'll need to keep opening those doors going forward regardless of the style of winning in which the front office decides to operate. Based on their extensions to Pratt and Lara, I suspect that the Brewers (and probably most of the teams) have a lot of concern about how the upcoming CBA could impact which doors they try to unlock next.

He MUST be one of those crazy dots over near the margins on one of those scatterplots.

If the Brewers are going to best their record win-total, regression-projections will be there all season. Projections don't typically project outliers, I wouldn't think.

I mean, his ceiling is high, too, but he's 5'7".

So... I'll be OTR to state that I was dubious about Pratt's extension at the time, but if the Crew extend Lara, I'm all about it. I don't think I even care what the number would be. I'm just a true believer in him being a "good" MLB starter. Just a really high floor, I think.

The satisfaction alone?

Others are convinced 2 or 3 starts of Skubal in a playoff series is worth watching Ortiz, Rengifo, Perkins, and oodles of other replacement-level position players for the next 6 seasons.

I prefer neither. The game is in a good place. I actually am optimistic that they will peaceably come to an agreement that satisfies both groups w/o a cap&floor, but with continued modifications to the systems already in place. More money will go to the players in some fashion or another in exchange for enhanced revenue sharing (including streamlining and standardizing local TV/MLB.TV) to mollify middle-market shoppers in free agency.

20-7

Good conversation. I think it is certainly fair to say the O's "won" the trade based on CheezWhizHed's argument regarding players that occupy key roles on a playoff team, and the "extra" value good players have in a playoff series. With that said, I think Joey Ortiz has been very nearly the player that the Brewers hoped he could become, and DL Hall has been a key lefty out of the pen this season. Ortiz's bat simply hasn't gotten over the hump in MLB to make him a key contributor on a playoff team, although he could still play a valuable role as a defensive replacement, I suppose. If DL Hall's best innings in a Brewer uniform are in front of him, he could certainly be a key player for a playoff team.

Would it be fair to compare him to Sproat? Or am I way off?

Its not about punishment. Its about precedent. And comparing Uribe and PCA in this context is apples/oranges. MLB has encouraged players to be more demonstrative on the field, but needs to maintain its authority between the lines so that teams don't fight with each other. A one-game suspension for a repeat "offender," in Uribe keeps MLB's authority intact, while not meaningfully punishing the team or player for a minor infraction that was publicly dealt with by the teams. With PCA, the league offered its implicit support to the players over fans when there is any conflict between the two. And while PCA didn't suffer any consequences from the league, his PR-work following the incident was a brutal punishment compared to anything Uribe would face. Its comparing a speeding ticket to doing community service.

I wouldn't expect a collapse. But I think it's fair to look at all of those guaranteed roster spots dedicated to guys well into their 30's to envision a decline to being merely good.

I think that is part of the point of trying different balls in different leagues. If they understand how different balls work, they have a better chance at finding the "perfect" ball for MLB. I look at it the same way them trying out new rules in lower leagues. Add in all of the variables in different leagues (e.g. low-altitude, hot humid air in the Southern League, or high-altitude, cool dry air in California League), and it's really impossible to make one ball to rule them all.

I'm not at all worried about the velocity yesterday, what with the soft mound. While I have no proof that the mound was actually softer, I have no doubt that every single road game, the grounds-crew have conversations with team personnel about ideal dirt moisture/grass length for the series. I'm also not worried about the leg cramps, yet. It's been reported that Miz has been pumping a lot of iron. I suspect the cramping is related. He also looked as relaxed as I've ever seen him yesterday. Maybe he just woke up really tired. Lots of plausible scenarios that aren't accompanied with klaxons and flashing lights.

I absolutely believe that Ashby's contract "allowed" the Brewers to use him the way he's being used. It's a role that perhaps is valued by winning teams with pitching depth, even though it may be detrimental to the earning potential for the pitcher. My two pet-favorite stats are innings-pitched, and runs scored, because they ARE counting stats that DO matter in the context of a single game. Every time a Brewer role player slides safely into home, or bridge those few outs in the middle, I feel like they earned their paychecks that day, and at the end of the season, Runs Scored and Innings Pitched show guys that post, and are believed to be the best option by the managers that play them that day. Innings-pitched bonuses are prevalent in the game. I see no reason why that couldn't be emphasized more to better compensate guys like Ashby/Patrick, which would better reflect the value they have to teams.

Different balls are different balls, no doubt, but I would suspect that teams are trying to teach their pitchers to beat hitters in-zone to combat all of the plate-discipline that teams are promoting with their hitters, too. Learning how to pitch in-zone and beat contact comes with a lot of bumps and bruises, as every little league pitcher learns the hard way.

I think it's fair to just leave the IGT in it's own little place in the Brewerfan world. The IGT is the equivalent of texting friends and family during the game. It's a private conversation in a public forum, and who among us haven't cursed a Murphy move, or Ortiz AB this season in the privacy of our homes and text threads with family/friends during an in-game moment? I think the IGT folks would make Murph proud of their relentless pursuit of perfection, and I'm guessing the dugout wouldn't call Murph a mope for verbally undressing Greg Jones in the dugout after airmailing his cutoff man. The IGT "mopes" keep the rest of us with Brewers-sunglasses on, honest with ourselves, and I appreciate them for it. I blame the Cubs, their manager, their CFer, and their fans for sewing discord here in the good place.

Like, not normal due to what we know about the human body? Or not normal because most teams don't typically use guys they way they use Ashby, because if a team has a guy like Ashby, he's almost never pitching in middle relief? It's unconventional, yes. But aside from baseball's long-established pitching roles, codified through conventional wisdom, player contracts based on stat-accumulation, video game player designations (CP, SU, RP, SP), and with an assumption that every pitcher experiences the same stress/recovery on their arm every time they throw, why do we assume that the Brewers are babying Miz, and overworking Ashby? Miz said he had one more inning after the 5th, so that's what Murph gave him. Ashby likes the ball all the time, and the pitching coaches and training staff (perhaps) recognize this and give Murph the go-ahead to use him. If we can all agree that there is the "right" amount of high-stress pitches over the course of a game, a series, a week, a month, a season, for a starter, or for a closer, why can we not agree that the "right" number of high-stress pitches for a middle reliever may be somewhere in-between? Last season, Miz threw 129 IP in 28 appearances (27 starts) between AAA and MLB. Uribe threw 75 IP in 75 appearances (19 back-to-back outings), and Ashby threw 66 IP in 43 appearances (3 back-to-back outings). Ashby is on pace for about 110 IP in about 80 appearances, and has had 3 back-to-back outings. So long as the Brewers keep giving him more days off between appearances as they would a leverage arm, isn't this simply a "Goldilocks" zone of arm usage between a typical starter's workload, and a closer's role?

There was a thread earlier this season about this topic, and at the time, I wanted Patrick in the rotation due to the history the Brewers have had developing young pitchers beginning with bullpen work, whether that leads to a backend role, like Hader, a swingman role, like Tobias Myers/Chad Patrick, or a starting role, like Burnes/Woodruff. So I wanted to just keep Patrick in the rotation to ease the transition for the young guns. However, the young guns have taken to the starting roles so comfortably, and as many have noted, Patrick has been solid working in relief, so I'm now totally onboard with Patrick moving full-time into a bullpen role of some kind. I don't care at all about using the length the lengthy bullpen guys have to offer. Instead I embrace it. Therefore, I'd love for Patrick to be a RH flex-piece out of the pen, like Ashby has been from the left, and let him roll through an order a couple of times. I think the Baseball World is ready for a new appreciation for long-relievers, with so many 5-and-dive guys in the league. They just need to re-brand the role, as swingmen have the long-standing reputation as being the last guys in the pen. With Ashby and Patrick, too, you can bring them in to finish an inning with one batter on back-to-backs to mitigate their weekly pitch-counts without sacrificing bullpen depth day-to-day. This is all with the hope that Uribe and Megill return to form, and that their remaining one-inning lefties (Hall/Rob Z/Fitzpatrick) can stay healthy and perform well-enough. (And it's easy enough to move Ashby to that role, and backfill with the rotation depth).

I agree that anyone that pays attention to baseball is rolling their eyes each time Murph says stuff like this. But Murphy was responding to a Cubs beat reporter's question. Murph wasn't talking to people that pay attention to baseball. He was talking to Cubs fans.

Are you referring to the exit velocities? Because that was the last step for me, personally, in his readiness, and he's posted some very nice exit velos lately. He's not just hitting to all fields, he's been hitting to all fields with some punch.

I've never understood referring to Burke as a power-over-hit profile. He hit to all fields and made good swing decisions in college, and much of that quality has been maintained in the minors. He always felt like a less-heralded Prince Fielder profile to me. Fielder was a really good hitter, not just "power-over-hit". Both of them more athletic than their physiques suggest. Write-ups seem to explain-away Burke's matching minor-league HR/SB totals, and always seem surprised when they say his glove is better than they expected. All of the same stuff scouts say about Burke is what they said about Prince as a prospect, except that Prince had a very famous baseball slugger for a father. Had he been an unknown, Fielder's path very well could have mimicked Burke's through the SEC. Prince was a borderline HOF talent, so I'm NOT suggesting Burke is Fielder 2.0, and I'm sure there are plenty of other variances in their games. I just think Burke gets unfairly typecast a lot due to his barrel-chested look. I think it's perfectly fair for scouts, with their jobs on the line, to stand on body-type precedents/long-term outlooks when projecting, but I think most of the time, it's just easier for them to predict meager outcomes, because that is ALWAYS the safest prediction for ALL prospects, and certainly the safer prediction for that body type. But based on his production, I just think scouts would like him a lot more, if it came from a guy that looked like Spencer Jones.

Wow. It just goes to show that for me, the Cubs manager could be Mother Theresa, and I'd be comfortable with people booing them. I see Craiggers wearing that hat, and I think, "Aww, I liked that guy!"

Overall: I think an outside reviewer of the organization would feel comfortable looking at the run-prevention units as "championship caliber*". I also think impartial observers would look at the Brewers 12-month track record of scoring runs, as "sustainable," while recognizing that their unconventional means of ranking 6th in baseball in runs/game, leave the reviewer curious and confused. So, for the objective among us, it looks like the Brewers are right in the thick of things, and like many teams of that tier, have some concerns about x, y, or z. A boring review, but that's how I'm assessing things. Position-Players: Even though I share the desire to improve the wOBA from the left-side of the infield (I'm less concerned about the OF/1B/DH situation), and am impatient for the team to do something --- anything! --- to try and remedy things, I think the Crew are stuck in a weird spot right now with prospect promotions/40-man spots unless they are willing to begin jettisoning the Perkins/Ortizes/Rengifos/Hamiltons (and other extra 40-man guys) of the world. The Brewers have three nearly-ready made replacements for Ortiz (Pratt), and Perkins (Lara), as well as an everyday utility type, in Jett Williams in AAA Nashville. All of Damon Keith, Dylan O'Rae, Dasan Brown, and Jesus Made have done enough in AA Biloxi to warrant promotions to backfill there. I'm unconvinced there would be a discernible improvement to the Brewers offense with any of those promotions, however, due to prospective playing-time (Lara playing in Perkins bench role), or due to the lack of big-league track record of performance (Pratt or Jett). It's easy to sit here any say that ANYONE can hit better than Ortiz, but instead, if one were to try and guess which of those two players were more likely to hit to a wRC+ of say, 80 for the rest of the season? That's a lot tougher (FWIW, Fangraph's projections suggest Ortiz is more likely to achieve that mark). It feels icky to me to imagine NOT doing anything. But I also feel like unless Made is ready to play defense at short everyday, like Konner Griffin, the internal options through promotions will just be lipstick on a pig, offensively. It may look more appealing, but I'm not sure it will change the Brewers fortunes in the fall. Pitching: The pitching situation, is no less confused, but I find it FAR more interesting. It looks to me, like the Brewers are strongly going to consider just backfilling the 'pen with their starters, and just continuing to pitch the hot hands in the hot roles. Reading his comments on the matter, it seems like Patrick is destined to be the RH Ashby. It looks like Drohan could grow into a leverage-role, like Koenig's former role. Crow has taken to the starting role, and Gasser's big-league stuff works well as the 12th/13th man in the 'pen, providing innings in blowouts. They've obviously leaned into finishing games with pitchers they are comfortable exposing to lineups twice through. Even though the back-end, leverage situations have been a roller-coaster ride, compared to recent Brewer seasons, I feel like the pure stuff that the SP-depth guys have to offer fit just fine in the bullpen, and really mitigate my concerns there. It's going to be really fun to see how this continues to develop. *non-Dodgers division (i.e. it's the Dodger's world, and we're all just living in it).